General Henri Bentegeat (left) presents the opening address of the 24th International Workshop on Global Security.

"The number of
major international players is increasing, which is creating new obligations;military action
has reached its limits, and new approaches are required"

It is a great privilege to
speak at this forum, which addresses every year, in a thought-provoking way,
the main security and defense issues on both sides of the Atlantic.

I am delighted that my
friend, General James Jones, will also be speaking to you. The fact that he is
a great patriot and military leader, a man of conviction who is also
thoughtful, and a man who spent time in France during his formative years makes
him one of the best assets for a strong transatlantic relationship. He and I
have gone through turbulent times in a spirit of mutual confidence and
comprehension.

Today I have no plans to
present a general policy expose nor do I intend to give you an exacting
presentation on European institutions. Everything has been said or will be said
here on our security environment and the challenges raised by the Near and Midlle East, Afghanistan, the Balkans, and Africa. Based on my experience of the past five
years, I am going to call your attention to the increasingly complex prevention
and management of crises.

As one of my staff
members put it when I asked him if we had made progress, “We were on the edge
of the abyss one year ago but we've taken a big step forward since that time.”
All joking aside, the game is undoubtedly getting more complicated, for three
reasons:

1. The number of
major international players is increasing, which is creating new obligations.

2. Military action
has reached its limits and new approaches are required.

3. Military
operations are getting more and more complex to run and manage, a fact that our
political and military leaders must take into account.

AN INCREASING NUMBER OF INTERNATIONAL ACTORS

Five years ago, it was
believed and acknowledged that the great strategic balances of the past had
become permanently obsolete. There was only one very large political, economic,
and military power—the United States of America. Whether this fact was viewed
with joy or regret, no one could deny that, as the sole major actor, the U.S.
had the advantage of exhibiting the values of democracy and freedom. This
undisputable predominance affected the credibility and functioning of old and
well-established institutions, such as the U.N. and NATO.

Since that time, however, the
international landscape has become considerably more complex. On the political
scene, Russia and China have reaffirmed in various ways their intent to be
involved in the most sensitive issues. Militarily, Japan’s rising importance
and India’s emergence have confirmed that these two countries have gradually
evolved and now hold a leading international role.

International organizations
are also assuming new responsibilities. The U.N. is deploying over 100,000 men
in more than 60 peace-enforcement operations and its modalities for action
include quick combat interventions, as was the case in Congo. On the African
continent, the African Union is becoming an indispensable actor in spite of its
current lack of capabilities. In the Middle East, the Arab League is taking on
a major role.

As to the Western world, NATO
and the EU are evolving and adapting. While other speakers at the workshop will
talk about the evolution of the Alliance, I am going to say a few words about
the EU’s adaptation.

ESDP, sometimes called “The
Defense Dimension of the EU,” or “Europe de la Defense,” has become a
reality. It was born in 2003 with the approval by the European Council of a
document called the “European Security Strategy.” Since that time, the European
Union has organized 16 missions or civilian, military, or civilian/military
operations in Europe, Africa, and Asia, four of which were military
peacekeeping operations or operations for imposing peace, with or without the
involvement of NATO’s collective capabilities. Today, the European Union is
conducting its own reform in order to create better synergy between its
capabilities for civilian and military action. A few years ago, Henry Kissinger
was wondering which phone number he should call in case he needed to call Europe.
Today, for this particular need, world leaders are well aware of Javier
Solana’s phone number.

The multiplication of actors
has made crisis management more complex. Of course, the U.N., NATO, and the EU
have similar objectives: maintaining peace and defending freedom and democratic
values. But the multiplication of crises and the arrival on the political scene
of new actors with different visions of the world as well as different
interests makes a close EU/NATO partnership even more necessary if both organizations'
efforts are to complement each other without competition or duplication.

In order for this
partnership to develop efficiently, several principles must be respected:

• Autonomy of decisions within each
organization—that is, no European caucus within NATO and no preemption of
European decisions by NATO

• Rejection of dogmatisms born out of irrational fears

We have no reason to fear
that NATO’s military power will overwhelm the EU’s limited military capability.
In the same way, we should not be afraid of developing the EU's capacity for
action. This capacity is neither being built against the United States, a major
and indispensable ally for European security, nor is it a threat to NATO, a
unique military alliance that is indispensable as well. Finally, we must
resolve the dual and difficult question of the reunification of Cyprus and the
place of Turkey in Europe.

On these bases, EU/NATO
complementarity must be organized in an atmosphere of trust and transparency.
The recent multiplication of contacts between military staffs and the exchanges
at the secretary-general level underscore the mutual willingness to develop
this partnership in a pragmatic way. This is all the more important now that
military action has reached its limits.

MILITARY ACTION HAS REACHED ITS LIMITS

Undoubtedly, the most obvious
sign of military action having reached its limit is the exhaustion of available
resources. To be more specific, there is a dramatic shortage today in the
number of deployable ground forces, in particular, with helicopters and
strategic and tactical air transport. All international organizations are
affected. As far as NATO and the EU are concerned, whose resources come mainly
from the same pool, we must recognize that either the “transformation” has been
insufficient or European nations are unwilling to spend money in faraway
adventures that receive little public support.

Nevertheless, we should not
go too far in excoriating the Europeans. Today, France and the United Kingdom
deploy 12% of their ground forces in operations, compared with 15% for the
United States. Although there is a difference, it is not that large. Still, how
can we not remember that, in 1991, 500,000 men were deployed in Kuwait during
the Desert Storm coalition? And how can we ignore the sharp reduction in
defense spending in Europe following the end of the Cold War?

The European Union has been
accused of not making a great enough effort to increase European capabilities.
This accusation is unfounded. The EU has initiated and continues to develop a
capability development process that is thorough, modern, and rigorous,
especially through the European Defense Agency. This has made it possible to
increase force interoperability while decreasing weaknesses through better
cooperation and integration. But defense budgets remain a national prerogative,
and many governments take advantage of the NATO security umbrella to limit
their effort.

Even setting aside the
resource problem, we must acknowledge the limits of purely military action, especially
in Iraq and Afghanistan. We have all become aware of the fact that it is
impossible to stabilize a crisis area without a reconstruction effort.
Attempting to eradicate violence without a global approach to the crisis as
well as a clear understanding of its origins and roots would be illusory.

In this regard, I
would like to underline the essential structural difference between the
European Union and NATO. NATO is a military alliance, the most powerful one in
world history, and it is also the indispensable instrument of the transatlantic
link. The European Union is not a military alliance; it is a community of
nations that has initiated a European integration process and whose means of
action are considerably more diversified than NATO's. These means include
commerce, development, finances, justice, police, environmental, and, since
2003, a limited but credible military action. This potentially provides the
European Union with a unique capability to act simultaneously on all levels of
a crisis to prevent or manage it.

Therefore, limiting
the EU’s role in the management of crises to that of civilian complement to
NATO military action is unreasonable. It can be done, though, and we are
preparing to do so in Kosovo and in Afghanistan. However, recent experience
shows the advantages of being able to manage a crisis in a centralized and
integrated way.

Of course, the EU
does not have the vocation or the means to manage all crises. But when crises
don't require a large military engagement, we should keep in mind and utilize
the EU’s potential to be a complete actor.

As I already mentioned, the
international landscape is getting more complex and military action has reached
its limit. For those of us who are military leaders, however, the increasingly
difficult conducting of operations has become our biggest worry.

PROGRESSIVELY MORE DIFFICULT MILITARY OPERATIONS

Many factors—asymmetric war,
multiple nations, growing recourse to legal intervention, the media, the desire
to win the hearts and minds of the people—are directly affecting the success of
our operations. The asymmetry of modern conflicts has been well documented in
many forms: military asymmetry, when a regular and powerful army is assaulted
by ill-equipped groups without uniforms; mode of action asymmetry, when our
firepower is paralyzed by suicide bombings or civilian crowds of women and
children; and behavioral asymmetry, when our publics demand that we use our
force in a perfectly controlled way while our adversaries have no qualms about
resorting to the most abject violence. Military powers are constrained by the
obligations placed upon them to proportion their military response to the
adversary, to spare civilians, and even to respect the environment.

For reasons of political
legitimacy, multinational operations have become the norm. But incorporating
multiple nations tends to decrease the efficiency of the force. Cohesion and
interoperability are difficult to achieve. Multiple national caveats and rules
of engagement seriously complicate the task of the force commander. I was even
told recently by a major NATO commander that, after 40 years of service in the
military, he had discovered a new form of command—the “bargaining” command.

The conducting of operations
is also hampered by the growing recourse to legal intervention in the military
arena. Those who participate in an operation are now responsible for all their
actions, as evidenced by the creation of the International Criminal Court.
While an omnipresent legal system is a fundamental protection for all, it can
have an unwanted result among military leaders who may, as a result, feel
inhibited and unable to take risks. Such risk is particularly severe concerning
the treatment of prisoners without clear legal status.

Finally, when they instantly
deliver to the “tribunal” of public opinion any action taken by our armed
forces, the media also contribute to inhibiting military leaders. The Internet
and the multiplication of cell phones make information control very difficult—though
there is a gain in transparency, the operational consequences of leaks can be
devastating.

Other challenges on the
ground, for example, the balance between force protection and the presence of
forces among a population, are also difficult to meet. How can we win a
country's hearts and minds if we stay in our bunkers? How, in some cases, can
we show the conflicting parties that we are impartial while needing to stay
close to local leaders?

I would not go so far as to
say that our soldiers are being placed in unbearable situations. Our elders who
fought in World War II tell us they saw much worse. But we do need to be aware
that the new constraints that place a burden on the conducting of operations
elicit diverging national attitudes that are not due to military leaders’
actions but reflect political choices that correspond to national parliaments’
ways of thinking and reacting. Although this may be regrettable, we must accept
it as a fact of life in a democracy.

CONCLUDING REMARKS

The growing complexity in the
management of international crises requires that all civilian and military
leaders make a great effort of humility, conviction, and competence. Decisions
to engage forces must also be well thought out and concerted, with a clear
vision of the final goal. A global strategy must also be defined and a
coordinator selected. Finally, our political leaders must have a precise idea
of the military means that are necessary and of the contributions our partners
will be asked to make.

All of you know well that a
long road must be traveled before we can reach the ideal scenario. A while ago,
American and European positions regarding conflicts were contrasted by invoking
Mars and Venus. Perhaps we need Minerva or Athena, the goddess of reason,
today.